Andersen allowed four goals on 20 shots in Tuesday’s 6-2 loss at Toronto, but he’s also minded the net as the Ducks (21-7-5) have ascended to the NHL’s best record.

“He’s durable, played back-to-back last week and was better in the second game than he was the first,” Boudreau said.

The backup spot behind Andersen has been in a constant state of flux this season, with John Gibson, Jason LaBarbera and Igor Bobkov all temporarily filling the role. The job is how Ilya Bryzgalov’s, however, and it sounds as though he could make his first start of the season on Friday in Ottawa.

Elsewhere…

Panthers at Flyers: Roberto Luongo vs. Steve Mason

Avs at Pens: Calvin Pickard vs. Marc-Andre Fleury

Leafs at ‘Canes: Cam Ward for Carolina, no word yet on a Leafs starter.

Caps at Jackets: Braden Holtby vs. Sergei Bobrovsky

Blues at Kings: Martin Brodeur for St. Louis, no word yet on a L.A. starter.

Oilers at Sharks: Antti Niemi likely for San Jose, no word yet on an Edmonton starter.

Goaltender Viktor Fasth was one of the 2013 campaign’s most pleasant surprises. He made his NHL debut at the age of 30 and got things off with a bang by winning his first eight NHL starts.

Although he did have some rough outings along the way, he didn’t slow down significantly and ended up with a 15-6-2 record, 2.18 GAA, and .921 save percentage. Meanwhile, Jonas Hiller bounced back from a poor start, but after playing in 73 contests in 2011-12, he’s not the clear starter going into 2013-14.

Anaheim might even trade Hiller and put their faith entirely in Fasth, but it wouldn’t be surprising to see them start the season with both goaltenders. After all, Fasth only has 25 games worth of NHL experience and as good as they have been, that’s an awfully small sample size to put your trust in.

In the short-term, it might make more sense for them to let Hiller and Fasth battle for playing time, but by the end of the 2013-14 campaign, they will be forced to make a decision.

Hiller’s entering the final season of his contract and if it’s a good one, he might seek a raise from his current $4.5 million annual salary. If they finish the season feeling confident with Fasth, then they might let Hiller walk if they haven’t already dealt him. If Fasth has a rough campaign though, the Ducks will be in a bit of a challenging situation.

They already have close to $42 million committed to 13 players in 2014-15, according to Cap Geek, so giving Hiller a raise might be painful. It will help though that Fasth’s contract with its $2.9 million cap hit expires in the summer of 2015, so if they opt to re-sign Hiller, then there will only be one season of overlap before their netminding costs get more reasonable.

In either scenario, you can expect Fasth or Hiller to be gone within the next two seasons. If one of them falters, then it wouldn’t make much sense to keep that one when Anaheim has some promising young goaltenders in the pipeline in John Gibson and Igor Bobkov. Even if both of them excel, it won’t be cost effective to retain both of their services for long given their contract situations.

So this is a key season for both Fasth and Hiller. Not only are they battling for the starting job, but they’re also fighting for their next gig, be it with the Ducks or another team.

While the United States and Canada kick off the 2011 World Junior Championships in different groups, they both were able to kick off the tournament today with wins, albeit in much different situations.

Team USA needed overtime to take out Finland 3-2 in their opening game of the WJC. Florida Panthers prospect Nick Bjugstad (pictured) scored the game-winner in overtime to give the Americans the win over a pesky and tough Finland team. Justin Faulk and Jason Zucker had the U.S.A.’s first two goals while Stars prospect goalie Jack Campbell played tough in stopping 32 shots. Finnish goalie Joni Ortio almost stole the show for the Finns stopping 27 shots including some spectacular saves throughout.

With the overtime win, the United States gets two points while Finland gets one point for reaching overtime. Unlike how the NHL awards points, you can earn three points for a regulation win but a win in overtime or the shootout only gets you two. Teams want to get the most amount of points in their group so they can earn a bye straight to the semifinals in the elimination round. The top team in each group earns a bye while the second and third place teams play in the quarterfinals.

For the tournament favorite U.S. team they’ll have to play a bit cleaner defensively and gain some killer instinct if they’re going to repeat as gold medal winners. Jack Campbell had to do his fair share to bail out his teammates in this game, a reminder of what he had to do throughout last year’s tournament to take the U.S.A. to the title.

Canada kicked off this year’s tourney with a 6-3 win over rival Russia. The two teams were matched up evenly through two periods of play, but in the third it would be all Canada scoring three goals in the final period to ice the game. Team Canada captain Ryan Ellis was their player of the game scoring a goal.

Six different scorers got on the board for Canada in the win while Olivier Roy led the way in goal. Jaden Schwartz had two assists to lead the way in points for Team Canada. 2010 top draft picks Erik Gudbranson and Ryan Johansen added goals for Canada as well. Igor Bobkov made 36 saves for Russia in the loss. Dmitri Orlov and Yuri Urychev each had two assists for Russia.

In the day’s other two games, Nino Niederreiter led Switzerland to a 4-3 victory over Germany while Sweden stomped on Norway 7-1 to win their opening round games. Both Canada and the United States resume action on Tuesday with the U.S. taking on Slovakia (8:00 pm) while Canada takes on the Czech Republic (4:00 pm).